Aruna Roy pulls up all parties for keeping mum on the ‘poor’

She further said that the effort of the government to take the benefits of the policies aimed at reducing poverty has been a failure because of “corruption,” “mis-governance,” and “arbitrary use of power”. “It would take decades (for benefits) to trickle,” she said.

Roy also trained her guns on the UPA government over the poverty line figure. “Whether we crunch them (the numbers) or fling them at people, they are a part of the attempt of the system to stymie common sense,” she said.

The institute awarded degrees to 119 students of its flagship Post-Graduate Diploma in Rural Management (PGDRM). Six students were conferred doctoral degrees for Fellow Programme in Rural Management (FPRM).

Speaking to the passing-out students of the institute, chairman Deep Joshi said there was a need to deepen democratic process to ensure that policies and programmes are translated into practice on the ground. This year marked the first year of the implementation of the IRMA’s five-year plan, which includes, among other things, increase of batch size, expansion of infrastructure and addition of centres of excellence, director Jeemol Unni said. She added that the institute’s Management Development Programme (MDP) achieved revenue target. “We had a total of 39 on-campus MDPs, including two coordinated by resource persons from outside IRMA, and 19 off-campus MDPs,” she said.